Startup Advice on Using Venture Capital

In Chapter 14 of 19 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, Boxee co-founder and head of product Idan Cohen answers "What is the Role of Venture Capital in Building a Company?"  Cohen shares its relevance as a tool to build things that might not have financial viability from day one.  He notes when it is useful in building products that later can be sold and when it is not a good idea.  Cohen shares concern around success being measured by raising venture capital, rather than creating a successful, profitable company.  He goes on to discuss different markets and technologies outside the Internet domain that would benefit from disruptive innovation and what variation of fundraising or venture tools could be applied there. 

This is Idan Cohen's Year 1 Capture Your Flag interview.  Cohen is co-founder and head of product at Boxee Inc, an online video software company.  Previous to Boxee, Cohen held telecom software innovation and developer roles at Comverse.  He was a Captain in the Israeli Defense Force (IDF) and graduated from Tel Aviv University with a Bachelors of Science degree in Geophysics and Art.

Transcript: 

Erik Michielsen: What’s the role of venture capital in building a company?

Idan Cohen: It’s a tool that was put in place to allow us to actually build things that might not have, you know, financial and business viability from day one. And, so that’s great. It’s an awesome thing, the fact that there’s a mechanism out there where you can, you know, someone can put faith in you because he thinks you have a good vision and an idea and a theme. And he can let you—he can give you that lay to go and build it, for a while, before you need to commit to any real business, because, you know, he understands that it will take time to build the product that you later can sell or you later can monetize but at this point, you can just start out of the blue and make it happen, or maybe there’s a learning process in that product that you need to achieve and you’re not gonna be able to pinpoint the right answer exactly from day one, and it will take a process and he’s willing to be patient with that. So that’s great.

I think that if you look at it, for instance, definitely today, then on one hand, a lot of people measure success by being able to raise venture capital and that’s extremely wrong, in my opinion, it’s just it’s becoming this competition or—people are getting so much credit for being able to raise money, being able to raise money shouldn’t be a lot of—shouldn’t get you a lot of credit. It means that someone out there believed in your vision, it’s great. There’s so many other ideas out there and maybe someone believed in your team and that’s even more important sometimes, or most of the time, but at the end of the day, your ability to deliver on the product and the business is much more important than actually being able to raise money.

I really wish that there were these tools also for other types of businesses, if someone wants to put together a restaurant, there’s no need for him to struggle and definitely in today’s economy, not being able to bring together a quarter of a million dollars to open that restaurant, yes, the numbers are not the same as the internet industry, it’s not gonna explode, it’s not gonna grow as a hockey stick and you’re not gonna be able to monetize it in the millions. But there should be better tools for other types of businesses to get built and established. So I wish that more people would take these tools that maybe—or some variation of them that were invented for venture capital, as we know it today for technology world. And apply it for other types of businesses.

Today we look at venture capital as tightly coupled with technology. Venture capital should be much more tightly coupled with entrepreneurship. So just someone having a good idea and having a good vision and being able to build a good team and go out and build a business, so I love the fact that there’s now, you know, for instance, Elon Musk doing space acts, this is awesome, yes, you know, yeah, it might be a business—a huge business in the billions of dollars just because of the cost of sending rockets into space, but still just someone being able to go out and do that, and I don’t know if he would’ve able if he wasn’t Elon Musk and didn’t have billions himself. But still, just the fact that I think these businesses are starting to see, you know, it’s not pure technology, it’s not internet, it’s not gonna acquire million of users, no, it needs probably like 10 actually that are gonna pay for these missiles. But it’s still gonna work. Same for cars, you know, if it’s from like Tesla or something like that. Just—I would love to see many more people supporting these kind of businesses. Just—or cameras, you know, why is the camera market not ready for disruption? Like why can’t someone build a better camera than what Canon and Nikon has been doing for—Nikon has been doing for 50 years I’m sure someone can. So for instance, now with those Lytro that came from a little bit of a different angle – I would like to see many more businesses like that. 

Idan Cohen on Finding Personal Best by Working in Small Teams

In Chapter 15 of 19 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, Boxee co-founder and head of product Idan Cohen answers "When Are You At Your Best?"  Cohen finds his personal best around people, enjoying brainstorming sessions and conversations with small teams.  He notes the challenges he has working alone and how 2-4 person conversations increase his productivity and the results he can bring to a group. 

This is Idan Cohen's Year 1 Capture Your Flag interview.  Cohen is co-founder and head of product at Boxee Inc, an online video software company.  Previous to Boxee, Cohen held telecom software innovation and developer roles at Comverse.  He was a Captain in the Israeli Defense Force (IDF) and graduated from Tel Aviv University with a Bachelors of Science degree in Geophysics and Art.

Transcript: 

Erik Michielsen: When are you at your best?

Idan Cohen: With people. I’m very social. And I enjoy just very good conversations and very good brainstorming sessions. So I think that, for me, it’s very important to have – not a too big of a team, but a small team that can just iterate very fast on ideas, and that’s when I see the best results from myself. By myself, it’s very hard for me to concentrate. 

I think like a lot of people I have, you know, an undiagnosed ADHD or something. So I’m just jumping all over, even with people, I’m jumping all over, but it’s just something about like a 3 or 4—like a conversation between 2 or 4 people, just makes it much more productive for me. 

How to Apply Corporate Work Experience in an Entrepreneur Job Role

In Chapter 16 of 19 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, Boxee co-founder and head of product Idan Cohen answers "What Skills Did You Learn Working in a Corporation That You Have Applied Building Your Own Company?"  Cohen finds the corporate experience especially useful after his startup grows to nearly 50 employees.  He learns about what motivates different employees who come in at different stages of the company's growth. 

This is Idan Cohen's Year 1 Capture Your Flag interview.  Cohen is co-founder and head of product at Boxee Inc, an online video software company.  Previous to Boxee, Cohen held telecom software innovation and developer roles at Comverse.  He was a Captain in the Israeli Defense Force (IDF) and graduated from Tel Aviv University with a Bachelors of Science degree in Geophysics and Art.

Transcript: 

Erik Michielsen: What skills did you learn working in a corporation that you’ve applied building your own company?

Idan Cohen: Mainly when you’re coming out of a corporation, you’re aware of the things that you don’t wanna apply to your own company. So at the beginning it’s all, you know, it’s all roses and it’s a very small team, you’re all working together but as it grows a little bit bigger, you know, not everyone is as committed as you are to the company, not everyone is working 14 hours a day or 12 hours a day, and it’s under—you know, it’s totally understood and that’s kind of the things that you see in corporate. So I think that coming out, you’re very burned by people not really moving and no one really wanting or having any real interest in changing things, and so you’re very excited about how a small company at start up—can move very fast and be so much more interesting and dynamic.

But then I think at least you understand how—what to expect of people, and what not to be disappointed about, and how you can motivate them the right way, because it’s still a smaller company, I don’t know how to build a thousand—you know, actually I haven’t built 100-person company, and I definitely don’t know how to build 1000 one—1000-person company. I’m sure that there’s other challenges and I’m sure there’s a lot of things you need to kind of digest and understand about the dynamics of that ‘cause then it actually becomes a corporate, I don’t know, look at Google, look at Microsoft, or look at Apple and look at Zynga, I’m sure that at the end of the day, there’s a thousand people there, it is somewhat of a corporate, there’s a lot people who are not doing that much, there’s people who can live in these islands where, you know, they—no one knows exactly what’s happening there, it’s just that’s the dynamic of a workplace.

And for me, that’s the things that I’m afraid of, and still so, you know, we’re now about 50 and you can still have kind of a grasp about what everyone is doing, and have your attention, you know, to what people are feeling and how you can help them maneuver out of it. And I’m very afraid of building a bigger company where I start losing that touch with the day-to-day of people. So that’s something that I’m kind of worried about, ‘cause I think that that’s what corporate really fail with, is just once you go over a number of—a certain number of people, you start losing touch.

Idan Cohen on Managing International Project Teams

In Chapter 18 of 19 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, Boxee co-founder and head of product Idan Cohen answers "What Have Been Your Greatest Challenges Managing International Project Teams?"  Cohen notes two perspectives.  The first is not being able to iterate quickly side by side.  The second he ties to consumer product development and the importance of having the entire team on board with the market, user and consumer. 

This is Idan Cohen's Year 1 Capture Your Flag interview.  Cohen is co-founder and head of product at Boxee Inc, an online video software company.  Previous to Boxee, Cohen held telecom software innovation and developer roles at Comverse.  He was a Captain in the Israeli Defense Force (IDF) and graduated from Tel Aviv University with a Bachelors of Science degree in Geophysics and Art.

Transcript: 

Erik Michielsen: What have been your greatest challenges in managing international project teams?

Idan Cohen: It’s about just not being able to sit in the same room, you know, just being able to iterate quickly with a few people sitting on a couch for a couple of hours, that’s very important. Doing it on the phone as much as we think, that, you know, with Skype and other tools, the world is flat, it just doesn’t work in a lot of cases.

And then probably the other really important thing is just when you’re creating consumer products, it’s so important for everyone to understand the market and the user and the consumer, and if you’re a small company, then you know it comes down to the last person, it’s the last developer or the officer manager, it doesn’t matter, or the HR woman, let’s say that does recruiting part-time for you, everyone needs to understand what you’re all working on in order to be able to really build the right product and that’s a huge challenge, when you’re working separately with teams in different places, it’s just not everyone seeing the same picture, that was a huge challenge for us.

Idan Cohen on Learning to Manage and Delegate Responsibility

In Chapter 19 of 19 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, Boxee co-founder and head of product Idan Cohen answers "How Are You Learning to More Effectively Hand Off Responsibility?"  Cohen notes the challenges of handing off his product vision to others as well as not diving into details enough.  He believes a balance must be found between the two and this is the underlying challenge he faces. 

This is Idan Cohen's Year 1 Capture Your Flag interview.  Cohen is co-founder and head of product at Boxee Inc, an online video software company.  Previous to Boxee, Cohen held telecom software innovation and developer roles at Comverse.  He was a Captain in the Israeli Defense Force (IDF) and graduated from Tel Aviv University with a Bachelors of Science degree in Geophysics and Art.

Transcript: 

Erik Michielsen: How are you learning to more effectively hand off responsibility?

Idan Cohen: So I think that I have this problem where I’m just—some—on specific things I would go into the smaller details, smallest details. And it would be extremely hard for me to hand off responsibility because I have the image of—the exact image of what something should look like as the end product, and it’s extremely hard for me to accept a different direction or different angle on it. On the other hand, I definitely do not dive into details, small details enough sometimes, so at some point I will hand it off and will just let someone else take care of it.

And that’s exactly kind of right now it’s a little bit of like the wrong way to do it, because it needs to be somewhere in the middle, ‘cause you need to be able to trust the other person—that the other person can achieve your final vision, be able to visit him along the way and guide but not impose your opinion, or the way you see it, not just having him, you know, do the work, but actually letting him think his way through it. So I think it’s important to find that balance between those—trying to do that.

How to Turn a Cancer Tragedy into Something Good - Slava Rubin

In Chapter 1 of 13 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, crowdfunding entrepreneur and IndieGoGo CEO Slava Rubin answers "What is Your Entrepreneur Story?"  Rubin recounts how after his father died of myeloma cancer, he tries to raise money to fight cancer.  The process proves painful and frustrating and, over time, Rubin meets what would be his two IndieGoGo co-founders, Danae Ringelmann and Eric Schell.   Slava Rubin returns to CYF for his Year 3 interview.  As CEO and Co-Founder, Rubin has helped transform cause and project fundraising by establishing his company IndieGoGo as a global leader in crowdfunding.  He is also active in philanthropy, starting the Music Against Myeloma annual charity event to fight cancer.  He graduated from the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania.

Erik Michielsen: What’s your entrepreneur story?

Slava Rubin: Yeah, so when I was 15, my dad died of cancer and then for 10 years I really couldn’t deal with it and then as a New Year’s resolution I decided to finally do something about it and I started my own charity called Music Against Myeloma. This was in the middle of the last decade when the internet really sucked for raising money. So, I tried using Myspace. I remember Facebook was smaller than Myspace and Twitter was nascent, YouTube was not owned by Google and Obama wasn’t a word. So, it was pretty challenging to raise money using the internet.

I had this discussion with two other peers Eric Shell and Danae Ringelman and the three of us all shared our mutual frustration of hard it was to use the internet to raise money. So, in January 2008, we decided to launch a platform that would democratize fundraising called Indiegogo and, you know, we persevered through the market crash of 2008 and 2009 and beyond reason continued to work at Indiegogo and really the last couple of years have been consistent growth and we’re excited now to be funding millions of dollars globally every month. So, that’s how I got here which is turning cancer into something good.

How to Find Meaningful Work With a Global Impact - Slava Rubin

In Chapter 3 of 13 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, crowdfunding entrepreneur and IndieGoGo CEO Slava Rubin answers "What Makes Your Work Meaningful?"  Rubin references how the crowdfunding projects his company has enabled give him meaning in their varied initiatives to solve problems and build solutions.  Slava Rubin returns to CYF for his Year 3 interview.  As CEO and Co-Founder, Rubin has helped transform cause and project fundraising by establishing his company IndieGoGo as a global leader in crowdfunding.  He is also active in philanthropy, starting the Music Against Myeloma annual charity event to fight cancer.  He graduated from the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania. 

Transcript:

Erik Michielsen: What makes your work meaningful?

Slava Rubin: We could be focusing on strictly becoming a billion dollar company optimizing profits and along the way really upsetting customers and trying to take advantage of employees but for us it’s knowing that there’s an impact. Knowing that we’re doing good in the world and bringing good things to life. So, that’s what’s exciting for me.

It’s really about stories like a crowd funded baby that would have never existed unless Indiegogo was there. Knowing that there’s kids in third world countries who are reading because two incredible women on a campaign called Illuminate were able to create an inflatable solar light, knowing that some kids aren’t gonna be bullied because an amazing movie was created called The Bully Project and was funded on Indiegogo then picked up by the Weinstein Company for distribution, knowing that a church has new stained glass windows because their community came together to know that they want to improve the architecture there or just knowing that a liver transplant happened through for somebody in Congo because he was known as the Oskar Schindler of Congo but couldn’t afford a liver transplant so on CNN, people came together and funded his liver transplant.

How Startup Raises First Venture Capital Round - Slava Rubin

In Chapter 5 of 13 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, crowdfunding entrepreneur and IndieGoGo CEO Slava Rubin answers "How Did Your Team Go About Raising Venture Capital?"  Rubin notes the importance of mission alignment and how this plays into goals, milestones, and responsibilities.  He details the transition from being a bootstrap financed startup to taking on convertible debt to deciding on venture financing to build out the team and user experience. 

Slava Rubin returns to CYF for his Year 3 interview.  As CEO and Co-Founder, Rubin has helped transform cause and project fundraising by establishing his company IndieGoGo as a global leader in crowdfunding.  He is also active in philanthropy, starting the Music Against Myeloma annual charity event to fight cancer.  He graduated from the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania. 

Transcript:

Erik Michielsen: How does your team go about raising venture capital?

Slava Rubin: I think it’s really important that the core team be aligned on knowing what we’re trying to accomplish. What size of a company are we looking to build? How many employees do we wanna have? What kind of revenue are we looking to accomplish? Where do we wanna sit in the competitive landscape and what are we trying to accomplish as a vision? All those things need to be agreed to. Where you’re singing the same song and after that it’s making sure that you know who’s playing what role. You typically don’t wanna have too many people in the process of actually try to raise the money because that can be confusing in terms of coordination and managing the process. So, with us specifically I'm leading up the fundraising process with significant help from the core team.

Erik Michielsen: Was this your first time raising venture capital?

Slava Rubin: Yes. So, we launched in January 2008 and the three founders Eric Shell, Danae Ringelman and myself we boot strapped through 2008. We planned on raising money in the fall of 2008 but then the crash of 2008-2009 happened, which really slowed things down for us. We then raised a small convertible note and followed that with a venture capital round of 1.5 million in March of 2011.

Erik Michielsen: And you used that to build out the team and now are looking at next steps to scale further?

Slava Rubin: Exactly. So, we went from a team of 5 to now a team of 19 and we’re continuing to grow and always looking on how to improve the customer experience.

What It Means to Be a Leader at a Fast Growing Startup - Slava Rubin

In Chapter 6 of 13 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, crowdfunding entrepreneur and IndieGoGo CEO Slava Rubin answers "What Does It Mean to Be a Leader in What You Do?"  Rubin notes leadership is about taking action that otherwise might not happen.  He notes it is less about being more aggressive than others and more about doing things others do not see that need to be done.  Rubin references his venture capital fundraising efforts while trusting his team to manage operations and grow the company.  Slava Rubin returns to CYF for his Year 3 interview.  As CEO and Co-Founder, Rubin has helped transform cause and project fundraising by establishing his company IndieGoGo as a global leader in crowdfunding.  He is also active in philanthropy, starting the Music Against Myeloma annual charity event to fight cancer.  He graduated from the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania. 

Transcript: 

Erik Michielsen: What does it mean to be a leader in what you do?

Slava Rubin: To me leader is really about taking action where otherwise it would not happen. So, just being to be aggressive and doing something where 10 other people were about to do it maybe is not always a leader but seeing what others do not see or more importantly doing what others do not see needs to be done is really about leadership.

So, we have 19 people on our team now and I would say at different moments each one steps up as being a leader and an example for me might be that a while back we weren’t sure if we were able to raise money and, you know, we were having debates about whether or not we should be even focused on raising money because maybe what we need to do is just work on our own team and get to profitability and at some point, you know, I just said, you know, I’ll go make it happen and you guys need to help support me to run the company and we just worked together to raise the money we needed a year ago when I saw you at South-By 2011.
The fun thing is since then we’ve had some serious growth, which is, you know, I guess I have to come here every year to make sure that growth keeps happening.

Erik Michielsen: How did you use your venture capital round to finance your growth?

Slava Rubin: Yeah, so I mean from a company-building perspective we really are focused on improving the product making sure that we’re reaching out to the customers correctly and making sure that the customer experience is as good as possible. So, very specifically we went from a five-person team to a 19 person team, really made significant improvements on the actual product, the website, the customer happiness experience and just keep on looking for people to help them with making good things happen.

How to Manage and Motivate Teams at an Internet Startup - Slava Rubin

In Chapter 8 of 13 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, crowdfunding entrepreneur and IndieGoGo CEO Slava Rubin answers "How Are You Learning to Better Manage and Motivate Teams?"  Rubin shares the new challenge of managing large teams.  He finds listening and action to be the two elements that help him be the best manager possible.  He discusses what he does to facilitate effective communication and alignment to vision.  Slava Rubin returns to CYF for his Year 3 interview.  As CEO and Co-Founder, Rubin has helped transform cause and project fundraising by establishing his company IndieGoGo as a global leader in crowdfunding.  He is also active in philanthropy, starting the Music Against Myeloma annual charity event to fight cancer.  He graduated from the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania. 

Transcript: 

Erik Michielsen: How are you learning to better manage and motivate teams?

Slava Rubin: I think that managing a team is something new since I haven’t managed large teams before but it’s definitely about listening and action. So, I would say that it’s very easy to get caught up in doing too many things and I'm learning along with my team on maintaining focus. Also, it’s very easy to just get caught up in e-mail and back and forth and not really have a quick discussion to make a decision. So, I think the decision making process and ensuring that everybody understands it is very important. Also, it’s important to have people aligned with the vision. It’s so easy in a dynamic company like Indiegogo where we’re hiring new people every month or sometimes there is a new decisions made on priorities for people to either make poor assumptions or actually not hear how we’re making shifts, so it’s really important to over communicate.

How Startup CEO Faces Company Building Challenges - Slava Rubin

In Chapter 9 of 13 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, crowdfunding entrepreneur and IndieGoGo CEO Slava Rubin answers "What New Challenges Are You Facing as Your Company Grows?"  He details the importance of selective recruiting in the hiring process and maintaining focus as new opportunities emerge that may not align with the vision.  He details how the company has learned to differentiate as over 300 competitors have entered the market.  Slava Rubin returns to CYF for his Year 3 interview.  As CEO and Co-Founder, Rubin has helped transform cause and project fundraising by establishing his company IndieGoGo as a global leader in crowdfunding.  He is also active in philanthropy, starting the Music Against Myeloma annual charity event to fight cancer.  He graduated from the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania. 

Transcript: 

Erik Michielsen: What new challenges are you facing as your company grows?

Slava Rubin: Company building is the number one challenge, which all about hiring the right people. It’s not okay to look and say ‘we’ll take anybody, we just need bodies’. See, that’s the beginning of the end for a great company especially one that’s our size. See, we can’t afford having just extra weight filling the spot. Everybody is a leader and everybody has to step up for different spots. So, number one is company building, number two is maintaining focus around the vision. At Indiegogo the challenge right now is not about what is the opportunity, I would say there are many opportunities to be had, the challenge is rather, what do we say no to and make sure that they we’re focusing as a team on the right things.

Erik Michielsen: You mentioned that over 300 companies have moved in to this crowd funding space, so how do you look at that as a competitive set versus look inside and just focus on your core and building that out?

Slava Rubin: Yeah, I mean, since we launched in January 2008, we now have over 300 competitors. Some competitors like to differentiate by country, so only in Australia or only in Germany or only in the US. Some like to differentiate by vertical, so only health campaigns or only cause or only theater. Some like to differentiate by business models, so free crowd funding, advertising based crowd funding or otherwise and for us the real win for the customer both the campaign owner and the funder is to create one platform where you can cross all these different verticals and have as open of a platform as possible. See, funders don’t think in vertical and they definitely don’t think in business model. They think in disposable income and they think about, ‘oh, I want to share my money or give or buy or contribute to this specific thing’ and when they see this campaign, it’s very easy to share another campaign with them and for us it’s really about having democratizing fundraising as our goal, creating a platform, which is open to anybody in the world to raise money for anything and in the process creating the best funder experience possible.

How Algorithms Increase Website Effectiveness - Slava Rubin

In Chapter 10 of 13 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, crowdfunding entrepreneur and IndieGoGo CEO Slava Rubin answers "As You Are Experiencing So Much Content Growth on Your Website, How are You Using Data and Algorithms to Manage It?"  Rubin shares the story behind his company aim to democratize fundraising and how they have implemented a Google Page Rank like algorithm to create a fair and balanced experience across all submitted campaign content.  Slava Rubin returns to CYF for his Year 3 interview.  As CEO and Co-Founder, Rubin has helped transform cause and project fundraising by establishing his company IndieGoGo as a global leader in crowdfunding.  He is also active in philanthropy, starting the Music Against Myeloma annual charity event to fight cancer.  He graduated from the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania. 

Transcript: 

Erik Michielsen: As you’re experiencing so much content growth on your website, how are you using data and algorithms to manage it?

Slava Rubin: Yeah, for us algorithms and making sure that we have a fair opportunity for anybody to get exposure on our site is absolutely key. Many other sites will use words like query and sometimes you have to have the right person to find yourself on the homepage. To us, the reason we’ve created Indiegogo is to democratize fundraising. See, the old days you went to a bank or even today and somebody sat in office and decided that you do not deserve that bank loan according to their risk model, and maybe that person had a bad day in the morning and maybe they just weren’t gonna approve anything that day, which isn’t really fair for you.

So, for us we believe in really the Google approach, which is allow everybody an opportunity and then create algorithms on how you determine where you get exposed. For us, that’s called the go-go factor and we’ve optimized that over the last two years, where it’s a very Google page rank like algorithm to determine how to promote your campaign across all of our different channels. So, if you wanna be on the homepage or in the press, in newsletters, in the popular section or in the blog you don’t have to write to us and say, I know the CEO, it actually wouldn’t even help. All you need to do is on meritocracy have your campaign get a high go-go factor. These include things like updates and funding velocity and different comments. So, anything where there’s activity around your campaign will help you get to a better go-go factor and get more exposure. Philosophically it’s like America, equal opportunity for all, not equal results guaranteed.

Erik Michielsen: What have you done about bringing on new people on the team to build that infrastructure in the company?

Slava Rubin: Enabling a scalable algorithmic approach to how you share campaigns is definitely something you have to think about from the beginning. So, the way we architected the site from a database perspective as well as how it displays things, right away we were thinking about what data we would be able to analyze and filter. We also have great talent on the team right away from the original founders straight through our new analysts that are physics and math double majors where we’re actually trying to ensure that the algorithms that we’re creating are not silly or easy to be gamed. As we get thousands of active campaigns every month, everybody wants to make sure that their campaign is being treated correctly, so we’re constantly updating, revising our algorithms to ensure that everybody is happy.

How Perks Incentives Improve Crowdfunding Success - Slava Rubin

In Chapter 11 of 13 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, crowdfunding entrepreneur and IndieGoGo CEO Slava Rubin answers "How Have Perks Incentives Been Game Changing for Fundriaising Campaigns?" Rubin notes how crowdfunding is not new, sharing how Joseph Pulitzer raised community donations to fund the Statue of Liberty project.  Rubin notes several reasons why individuals give money to finance projects or campaigns.  He notes how perks incentives entice people by giving they something in return for their contribution.  Slava Rubin returns to CYF for his Year 3 interview.  As CEO and Co-Founder, Rubin has helped transform cause and project fundraising by establishing his company IndieGoGo as a global leader in crowdfunding.  He is also active in philanthropy, starting the Music Against Myeloma annual charity event to fight cancer.  He graduated from the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania. 

Transcript: 

Erik Michielsen: How have perks incentives been game changing for fundraising campaigns?

Slava Rubin: Crowdfunding is not new, so if you go back to the late 1800’s the Statue of Liberty was actually crowd funded. Back then, Joseph Pulitzer was able to use the New World -- the precedent to the New York Times to be able to raise, I believe nearly $120,000 on average contribution of 83 cents. At that time they didn’t use any perks. So, you didn’t get your name on the base of the Statue of Liberty. You didn’t get a tax deduction. It wasn’t a 501C3 and you definitely didn’t get any profit meaning you didn’t get $5 back for your $1 contribution.

There’s really four reasons why anybody funds anything in life. Number one is because you care about the person, the cause or the campaign. Number two, is you want the perks like you’re bringing up. Number three is you wanted to be part of the community, your personal ego and number four is for profit. So, on Indiegogo and really any platform in America, it’s illegal to do number four through public solicitation. So, the first three are what’s really important. The perk concept, very similar to the PBS or NPR sponsorship model is key because people get something in return. People like something exclusive, special, limited edition or discount. So, it’s amazing to know that in funding somebody’s campaign or vision or idea you get something tangible, virtual or very unique experience in return.

Why Legalize Startup Crowdfunding For-Profit Investing - Slava Rubin

In Chapter 12 of 13 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, crowdfunding entrepreneur and IndieGoGo CEO Slava Rubin answers "What Role Does Government Relations Play in What You Do?"  Rubin notes how the entrepreneurial campaign element of his crowdfunding company IndieGoGo has allowed him to collaborate with President Obama's Startup America Initiative and help startup business initiatives receive financing.  He notes the potential in for-profit investing using crowdfunding.  Slava Rubin returns to CYF for his Year 3 interview.  As CEO and Co-Founder, Rubin has helped transform cause and project fundraising by establishing his company IndieGoGo as a global leader in crowdfunding.  He is also active in philanthropy, starting the Music Against Myeloma annual charity event to fight cancer.  He graduated from the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania. 

Transcript:

Erik Michielsen: What role does government-relations play in what you do?

Slava Rubin: Well, we’re actually really excited that we’re partner with President Obama’s Startup America to help stimulate entrepreneurship in America. So, there’s three major groups of funding categories on Indiegogo. Number one is creative, number two is cause and number three is entrepreneurial. So, within entrepreneurial it’s really important to figure out how we can work together. I mean, there’s great case studies of entrepreneurial campaigns for example Walk In Love, which went from a single designer who was selling t-shirts in a kiosk was able to fund his campaign on Indiegogo and now has 15 employees in a Lancaster, Pennsylvania Mall or two engineers in California that were turned down by 43 VCs were able to fund their electronics product on Indiegogo and then got a $650,000 investor or a gluten-free bread company that was able to start from her own kitchen and now be named by CNBC as one of the Top 15 Start-ups in America. These are all examples of how people can use Indiegogo today. In the future, there’s the potential for the government shifting the law around funding online and being able to allow for-profit investments, which would be very interesting.

Erik Michielsen: And where does it stand today and, you know, what are the hopes for tomorrow?

Slava Rubin: So, this is very timely question actually just this week there was a new crowd funding law that just passed the House of Representatives. So, that’s actually two bills that have passed in the house to allow crowd funding to become legal, specifically what that would mean is that you don’t have to be accredited investor, which means you don’t have to have over a million dollars of net worth and the actual entity raising the money would not have to register with the SEC, which can be a very cost prohibitive process. The White House is very much behind this proposal, which they’ve already said but the Senate has not weighed in yet. So, really it’s a matter of seeing what the Senate will see and if any of the financial institutions that are lobbying against this will slow this down really allowing crowd funding to become a for-profit opportunity will really bring in significant more liquidity into the funding of entrepreneurial businesses and allow for many more jobs to be created.

Courtney Spence on Why Non-Profit Invests Big in Social Media Marketing

In Chapter 12 of 19 in her 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, non-profit executive Courtney Spence answers "How is Your Non-Profit Learning to More Effectively Use Social Media?"  Spence details how her organization's social media marketing strategy has shifted drastically over the past few years.  She notes how traditionally non-profits are encouraged to invest most funds in programming and how that is finding more balance with marketing and communications initiatives involving social media.  Courtney Spence returns to CYF for her Year 3 interview.  As Founder and Executive Director, Spence leads non-profit Students of the World to empower college students to use film, photography, and journalism to tell stories of global issues and the organizations working to address them.  Spence graduated with a BA in History from Duke University.

Transcript:

Erik Michielsen: How is your non-profit learning to more effectively use social media?

Courtney Spence: So we realize, we tell stories of others, we don’t tell our own. We realize, oh, we’re on Facebook and Twitter and we had a website, but there was not real purpose or thought or monetary investment behind those efforts. I think that we’re seeing this transition from particularly in the non-profit world, you know, it’s you do your programming and your fundraising and your management, your administration, your marketing and communication, and, you know, you wanna put all or your money into programming, and that’s – the IRS encourages that, everybody wants to see that, but the truth is, that, you know, marketing and communications are no longer just something that you do on the side, they’re really essential to programming and I think that – I mean, this is what we believe at Students of the World that, you know, storytelling and video and photography and animation are all essential parts to fulfilling a mission because we – ‘cause non-profits truly causes are about movements, and movements take people and if people don’t know that you exist, how are they gonna you’re your movement?

So we – I think you’re starting to see a shift and I think we’re just at the very, very tip of it, very beginning, but you’re seeing a shift from some non-profits and causes that understand the real need to invest in social media and that it’s not something we do on the side and it’s not something we should be ashamed about doing or that we should downplay, it’s something that should be integral to our programming because that will make us more effective fundraisers, it’ll make us more effective as an organization, it’ll help us create a movement, and that is what is so exciting about social media and the possibilities but I think that’s also the great challenge is how do we – when budgets have to be slashed, when organizations can’t spend as much time, media marketing is like one of the first things to go and I think that’s a big mistake and that’s quite frankly a mistake that we made at Students of the World.

And it was only in the last, again, 6 months where it was like we can no longer afford to just sort of – pardon me, but kind of half ass that. We have to really invest in that, because that’s what we do, but that’s also how we’re gonna go build our movement and do what we do much better and bigger than we ever dreamed. So our whole approach to social media has drastically shifted.

When to Walk Away From Your Startup and Move On

In Chapter 17 of 17 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, leadership philosopher Bijoy Goswami answers "When Have You Had to Walk Away From Something Dear to Your Heart?"  Goswami shares the story of his first startup venture and coming to the decision to move on and pursue something else.  He recounts how he separated from his business partner and worked on a software company for several years before making the decision to take a new direction. 

Bijoy Goswami is a writer, teacher, and community leader based in Austin, Texas.  He develops learning models, including MRE, youPlusU, and Bootstrap, to help others live more meaningfully.  Previously, he co-founded Aviri Software after working at Trilogy Software.  Goswami graduated from Stanford University, where he studied Computer Science, Economics, and History. 

Transcript: 

Erik Michielsen:  When have you had to walk away from something dear to your heart?

Bijoy Goswami:  You know, I would say my first venture, you know, that I worked on the start-up with this software that was meant to be a knowledge network that was wiring up knowledge networks, human knowledge networks things that evolved that had become Facebook and LinkedIn and things like that over the next few years and what happened there was I had – I started this project with a friend of mine who we’ve said we’re gonna go and do this venture together. 

We ended up doing the venture, getting all the people involved and then at some point we weren’t able to get the traction that we needed in the marketplace. It was early 2000, things like that and not only did the employees go but this buddy Bruce and I, Bruce said okay, I gotta move off on this thing and so I was like, what do you mean, we’re just going, we’re just getting going here, yeah we had. You know, I was like the knight in the Holy—in the Crusades, the just a flesh wound, you know and the Holy Grail. Comeback here where are you going and so I continued working on that for a few years actually as a one person software company and we had the software and I was working on the software and actually all the revenue that the company ever had as a software company I sold as a one person software, you know, company. 

But then it just kind of like, I just couldn’t keep it going, you know, and more than that I think other things started too, other projects started to emerge Bootstrap and Human Fabric and all these other things and so I had to say that’s gonna be put back on the shelf. And it wasn’t like, it wasn’t like – I don’t remember making that decision explicitly it just sort of evolved that way but it’s also like that just I don’t know what to do with that thing anymore. I'm not getting – I can’t do it by myself. I found that, you know, projects that I do myself don’t have enough momentum and I'm not getting enough help to continue it and I don’t, you know, so, all right I gotta let go of it, you know.

How Online Business Refines Social Media Marketing - Michael Margolis

In Chapter 12 of 17 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, educator and entrepreneur Michael Margolis answers "How Are You Learning to Use Social Media More Effectively in Your Business Pursuits?"  Margolis shares how social media marketing is fundamental in growing his online info product business.  He notes why his team has been changing its social media approach, in particular with data analytics and conversation marketing, as the company grows.  Michael Margolis is founder and president of Get Storied, an education and publishing platform dedicated to teaching the world how to think in narrative.  He earned a B.A. in Cultural Anthropology from Tufts University. 

What Makes Social Media Work Meaningful - Mike Germano

In Chapter 2 of 19 in his 2012 Capture Your Flag interview, social media ad agency CEO Mike Germano answers "What Makes Your Work Meaningful?"  After seven years in business, Germano finds creating engaging social experiences using innovative technology most rewarding.  He shares an example from a Red Bull mobile marketing campaign.  Mike Germano is co-founder and CEO of DUMBO, Brooklyn based social media advertising agency Carrot Creative.  Previously, Germano ran for and was elected to public office in Connecticut.  He is a graduate of Quinnipiac University.